2011-12 was a good year for deer hunters

By Mike MarshSports@StarNewsOnline.com

Saturday

Jun 30, 2012 at 12:01 AMJun 30, 2012 at 4:58 PM

Harvest was third highest since record keeping began in 1976

The North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission recently announced statistics from the 2011-12 deer season, and they prove biologists' predictions – a population stabilized at 1.35 million and a leveling of the harvest. The 2011-12 deer harvest was 173,553, the third-highest number since record keeping began in 1976. Evin Stanford, the commission's deer biologist, said it was remarkable, considering hunter reports during the season."People complained about poor hunting, but the overall harvest didn't change much," he said. The harvest record of 176,297 occurred in 2008-09. The second-place harvest of 175,157 occurred in 2010-11.Percentages of bucks, button bucks and does were similar to the 2010-11. Antlered bucks comprised 46.1 percent of the 2011-12 deer harvest; does 45.0 percent; and button bucks 8.9 percent. For 2010-11, antlered bucks comprised 45.9 percent of the harvest; does 45.4 percent; and button bucks 8.7 percent. The combined doe and button buck harvest continued a trend toward a higher harvest percentage of antlerless deer for the fifth consecutive season."Over the last few years, harvests have been very close together," Stanford said. "That's likely the result of stabilization of the population, although we did implement some regulations over the past couple of years that could increase harvests, including extension of the muzzleloader season by one week with a corresponding shortening of archery-only season by one week, adding Sunday archery and crossbow hunting and extending the season in the western region."Districts 1,2 and 3 – which include the coast and counties on near Interstate 95 north of Raleigh – were hit hard by Hurricane Irene and showed substantial declines from 2010-11. But District 4 – the counties west of Wilmington to Rockingham and north to Harnett County – experienced few adverse hurricane impacts and showed an increase. Stanford said some areas in the Coastal Plain and Piedmont also experienced a heavy mast crop."When there is a heavy mast crop, the deer are still there, but hunters aren't seeing them because they are feeding in forests and not responding to open agricultural areas or bait piles where hunters normally find them," he said. After a hurricane, hunters have other things on their minds besides hunting."Epizootic Hemorrhagic Disease (EHD) was reported in 42 counties. The disease can be fatal to deer and is spread by midges. In years with good conditions for midges, EHD outbreaks occur."While we didn't have as much EHD in the western parts of the state as the eastern parts, the harvest numbers don't really jump out because we see fluctuations all the time," he said. "We don't have any way to measure hunter effort, disease mortality and whether declines in deer harvests are related to mast production."